* The numbers of innocent kabaza customers — either getting injured or dying on our roads — are quite depressing
* We have, therefore, rolled off this campaign to sensitise them on their safety so that they can make well informed choices and decisions before they take on any ride
By Jamal Jamal, Correspondent
Road Safety Alert Foundation (ROSAF) has embarked on a campaign to raise awareness on safety for kabaza customers in the country’s major towns and cities.
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Themed; ‘Safe Ride is your right and responsibility’, ROSAF has so far taken the campaign to cities of Lilongwe, Zomba and Blantyre.
ROSAF Executive Director, Joel Jere said they have decided to embark on this campaign on realisation of the increasing numbers of accidents involving kabaza passengers in the country.
“The numbers of innocent kabaza customers — either getting injured or dying on our roads — are quite depressing” he said. “We have, therefore, rolled off this campaign to sensitise them on their safety so that they can make well informed choices and decisions before they take on any ride.
“Personal safety should be their first priority. During this campaign, we are pleading with customers to always go for motor cycles which are registered and whose owners have crash helmets and licenses.
“If these three things aren’t there, then the customer is taking a huge risk,” Jere said, adding that reducing accidents which involve kabaza operators and their customers in the country, should be a “joint effort.”
“As an organisation that works to promote safety on our roads, we have taken the lead, but there is need for a multi-sectoral approach to minimise the rate of carnage and make kabaza, a preferred and safe mode of transport for many Malawians,” he said.
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And to ensure that kabaza operators get licenses, Jere says ROSAF has introduced a safety training to train them on road safety — “so that at the end of the training, they have a chance to get a licence through the Directorate of Road Traffic and Safety Services (DRTSS) to enable them operate freely”.
ROSAF is a non-profit organisation that works to reduce road accidents in the country through education and advocacy.
